


counterculture

by Carbonated_Blood



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Trans, F/F, Sorry for keeping angst behind a/b/o
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-30
Updated: 2020-05-30
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:35:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24454543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carbonated_Blood/pseuds/Carbonated_Blood
Summary: Marianne's an alpha but she just wants to be a girl.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	counterculture

“█████! Get up bud!” It’s the first thing Marianne hears each morning. While her eyes adjust to the rising sun, her legs drag beneath a mound of dirty clothes, and she tries to remember where she is, she hears that name. “█████” It wasn’t a bad name by any means, yet in Marianne’s world it grew to be resented.

“Yeeah.” She crones out from her bed, if just to let her father know that she was awake. After that, she remains still, keeping eyes fixed onto the ceiling of her room and simply pondering on the day to come. They weren’t negative or positive thoughts, just thoughts. Grey and meaningless. 

As Marianne’s father is setting a table to flaunt meager, ceramic, bowls of cereal, he can overhear his daughter opening her bedroom door, only to shut the bathroom’s behind her. If Marianne were to look in the bathroom mirror she’d see… well, she avoided mirrors when possible, so that’s hardly relevant. The faucet runs, and fingers test a cool stream until it warms. Maintaining a comfortable enough temperature, Marianne splashes water onto her face, palming away at rough cheeks before drying with a washcloth. She always saw people do it on tv, splashing water on their face, so there had to be some credence behind it. Even if that wasn’t the case, the sentiment that came with trying to take care of herself usually did well for her mental wellbeing. What was of particularly less help was how her fingers lingered, how they felt across her face, her jaw, her chin. When she felt over flesh with those persecuting fingers, all her mind could muster were dysmorphic images of someone she was sure she was. Someone she never wanted to be, someone everyone thought she was, someone who-- “█████! Come eat!” Now the mirth within the man’s voice had its place taken by a tonally neutral haste. Marianne’s fingers stopped, as did her mind. The skin of her jaw even tingled some from all the incessant rubbing. “Coming!” Marianne’s face is static as she speaks, any and all expression being carried in her voice alone. 

Even as Marianne enters the kitchen, she still clings to the fact that she half-washed her face. Getting something productive done early would shape the rest of her day, it’s all she told herself. Her father speaks, smiling over a shoulder as he was putting on his own uniform for work. “Finally up huh? Sleep well?” Enthusiasm spreads like a contagion, spurring Marianne to smile herself. “Um… yeah, well enough.” It’s plenty enough for him, cuing the man to look back down to his top, fastening the few buttons that shielded his chest. Marianne sat to eat her breakfast, cereal that had begun to sog, while her father remained standing, picking up his own bowl to finish it off. Their morning ritual is rather quiet, as it always tends to be. Every word that could be spoken is instead shoddily communicated and misconstrued through feebly tossed gazes. Everytime one of Marianne’s overgrown tresses fumbles into her mouth while she eats, the girl throws a glance to her father, only to catch his eyes hastily peering away. She already knew what he was thinking, she didn’t want to hear it. “You need a haircut.” No, she didn’t think she did. 

___

The drive to Garreg Mach, soon after her departure it would become the route to her father’s work, was a comforting, familiar thing. Though, it had not aged enough for her to see it in such nostalgic hues. In the present, as she drew breath, it was that same monotony. Seeing the same houses roll by, the same storefronts fade away, and the same water tower that was only visible when she knew her school was nearing. Spotting that, she knew she’d have to wake up from the realm between a nap and lucidity. While her father eased what was an unappealing, yet reliable, wagoneer to a stop along the curb, Marianne’s fingers fidgeted. Her thumb raked along the edge of a sturdy rectangle of plastic, one that hung around her neck by a yellow stretch of fabric. A lanyard, and printed onto the obtuse sheet of plastic was a picture of Marianne’s face, her very own visage, labeled-- “Edmund, █████ - a.”

Plastic levers cue mechanical latches within a car door, and Marianne, hoisting a poorly put together backpack over her shoulder by a single strap, steps out the passenger side, bending down to meet her father’s gaze. Leaned over the console from his seat, the man smiles behind a pair of square spectacles he’d only adorned when he’d taken the wheel. “Have a good day buddy, I love you.” Marianne’s smile is sullied with sorry, baggy, eyes, though still rises, dimples mirroring one another as she does so. “I know, love you too…” With her back turned, Marianne closes the door behind her, allowing herself to endure another day of the same routine. 

As soon as her father drives away, the claws of insecurity begin to rake into Marianne’s being. It only takes one peer’s glimpse to urge the girl to begin hoisting her backpack with both straps, almost feeling ridiculous for the innocuous action that was wearing it with a single strap. 

Pale halls are made sterile by routine sanitation, the samie, fabricated, scent somehow potent enough to overwhelm the concoction of smells given off by the mass congregation of students. Keeping her skull low and eyes lower, Marianne is able to catch the scent of well washed floors alone. Taking in her own scent would be just about impossible, seeing as the girl had seventeen years to grow acquainted with it. That musk was hers, yet she wanted none of it, and was even grateful that she could barely make the smell out anymore.

The door to her class is weighty, unnecessarily so. The faculty and staff are well aware, yet it's been months since the school year began and nothing has been done. Shoving the stubborn barrier in, Marianne is allowed entry. Inside a brick of polyester walls are the scarce few classmates that arrived as early as Marianne did. She didn’t need to look up to see who was present, the masses of color within her peripheral were verification plenty. 

Lanyards held information on each student, and spoke such things freely through an arial font. “Gloucester, Lorenz - b.” From a cursory glance, Lorenz was a prep, and seemingly the one person in the school who still clung to terms like ‘prep’ anyhow. All anyone knew was that his father was an alpha, and that Lorenz himself was always trying to outweigh his birthing as a beta with excelling performance in school. It all simply culminated in him coming off as a tryhard brown-noser. “Ordelia, Lysithea - b.” A few years beneath the average student in her class in age, Lysithea was noted for having leapt up a few grades thanks to her excellence in earlier years of education. Lysithea was similar to many other students, she wore the same uniform, watched the same tv, had the same brown hair pulled out of her eyes, yet she strived so much harder than the rest for whatever reason. That ‘reason’ wasn’t so unknown to some, to Marianne. She knew well that Lorenz and Lysithea weren’t allowed the pleasant, simple, existence that other kids their age had. No, they had to vie for above and beyond. They were only betas. Marianne, with a desk purposefully nestled near the back of the classroom, laid her head down as she trained eyes on the clock, and tapped her forearm to the beat of songs she could bear to remember.

Through the lens of a half-lidded gaze, Marianne observed the colored blobs she called classmates funnel into the room. Orange, steady-paced, that was Leonie, she showed up early for track related things, that’s what Marianne believed at least. Green, small, it must be Ignatz, a relatively simple and sociable classmate, one who was often followed by-- Khalid, Marianne could even see the blur in her vision walk with a subtle swagger. A rather tall blur, a natural hue of brown and beige, it was their teacher, Mister Essar. His presence is what caused Marianne to actually begin opening her eyes, sitting up some as the beginning of class had become eminent. Like clockwork, the first of two missing students arrived. Raphael, a large boy who stayed off most peoples’ shit lists through sheer good vibes alone, entered, having to turn himself sideways to properly navigate between desks. Nonetheless, his backpack managed to bump and invade the space of a few classmates. Reaching the back of the room, Raphael takes his seat beside Marianne, offering the girl a smile as he lowered his bag beneath a desk. “What’s up man!” Without hesitation, the boy raises a knuckle to face Marianne and await her riposte. Unable to mull over his choice of words, as she was too busy getting muddled in his warm smile, Marianne raises her own limp fist, bumping his with a quiet “What’s up…” a smile finally beginning to work it’s way onto her mien. Raphael, with his grand form, pushed the limits of Garreg Mach’s uniforms. His black dress shirt stressed the twine that held his buttons in place, a yellow tie running between the boy’s pectoral muscles. One final decoration that adorned the lad’s torso was his lanyard. “Kirsten, Raphael - Ω.” 

As the motions of class came, Marianne’s own mind went, drifting out of reality and into her own recesses. Hanneman scrawled onto a blackboard symbols that ought to be english, but seemed to be no more than lyrical soup to the girl. She read each word just fine, though processed none of it, grasping the pronunciation and sound of each syllable within her mind. She learned nothing, not like this. Her mood is a dull one, an unnamable emotion that comes with an acknowledgment of her apathy, and a mourning for her failure to put out proper effort. “█████.” Mister Essar’s voice cuts through the dense air that began clogging Marianne’s bubble, forcing her eyes back open. “...Can you tell us the value of Z, Mister Edmund?” At ‘Z’ the thin chalk he held tapped the board, gesturing to… a line, the longest line on a right triangle. The other two strokes of chalk had numbered values, there was even an equation present but… “Uh…” Marianne’s voice drones, the only source of noise in an otherwise silent room. “Um, I… think it’s… I-I’m not exactly sure...” Her teacher’s face is easy to read, his subtle agitation with her not having the answer he most likely had just explained plain for all to see. Hanneman selected her for no reason other than her being clearly out of it, to make an example. A third voice sings into the mix, Khalid’s. “C’mon Teach, don’t pick on █████ just ‘cause he clearly didn’t know the answer. Why not Lorenz? He clearly needs the attention.” Lorenz HAD gone quite a while without attention, though didn’t speak on the jab, not when everyone could see. Hanneman’s brow simply knits. “I don’t believe I need your advice on how to teach my class, Mister Riegan, perhaps you’d be better off--” Any proper riposte is cut off by the abrupt opening of the classroom’s door. Being in the middle of a lesson, everyone tentatively stared to see who was late, even if they all knew full well who it was. Hilda slinks in, wearing an apologetic smile as she creeps between desks, attempting to seamlessly find her seat, silently whispering “sorry” all the while. Her entrance does not go without comment, not from Mister Essar. “Miss Goneril, are you aware that recurrent tardies tarnish not only your grade, but the learning environment for your fellow students?” Steadily spinning on a heel to defend herself, Hilda faces Hanneman, prime to plead her case to the man. It’s then that Marianne catches a glimpse of the girl’s lanyard. “Goneril, Hilda - Ω.” 

___

While class dawdles on Marianne keeps her head low, with untame, periwinkle, locks strewn across the desk in a disorderly manner. Eyelids weigh down, irises dull, and nostrils flare. Students once again become little more than gaussian blurs, Marianne’s mind instead fully dedicated to the digestion of scents around it. ...Meat, not a gamey cut but instead a sweeter breed, almost like pulled pork… It was Raphael’s scent, having him seated right next to Marianne caused her senses to be clogged by his savory aroma each day. It gave her an appetite. Leaning her head forward atop folded arms, Marianne’s nose sifts through the class a bit more, having to put in ample effort to detect anyone whose name didn’t begin with ‘R’ and end in ‘-aphael Kirsten’. Sitting ahead of her was Ignatz, then Lorenz; Both betas with relatively subtle scents, the two gave away pleasant enough, natural aromas. As much as Lorenz would like to smell like rosedew and bergamot oil, he instead carried a natural, almost animal, scent, like a cat in need of a bath. Ignatz carried a more tame, coppery, scent, though one’d be forgiven for not immediately picking up on it. His natural aroma was often clouded beneath a swathe of fumes from what had to be aluminum and some sort of paint. Accidentally catching whiff of such in class often caused Marianne to recoil. The abrasive, poignant, scent is all Marianne has perception of as her mind fades, and her consciousness ebbs away. 

Marianne’s mind carries the burden of a presence once again as something tugs her towards reality. She can make out a passing dream, one in which people won’t look directly at her. In a world mirroring her own, Marianne spectates how people she knew and spoke to would blatantly disregard her, letting her remain aware that they were willingly ignoring her. The girl moves, and swears she’s to step in a hole. With a jerk of her ankle, she’s out of the dream and back in reality. 

A few students, Ignatz, Leonie, had already left, and everyone else was on their way out, muling backpacks and making sprightly conversation. Marianne’s head rises, eyes peering across the room to spy the look on Mister Essar’s face. Disappointment, that’s what she read it as. His eyes lingered on her as she made efforts to avert her own gaze, never relenting. Marianne must have really been knocked out if she had missed all of class, a guilt wracking thought really. She simply wanted to leave the class and be done with the possibility of chiding. 

Hanneman’s vision extends through flat lenses, keeping a watch on Marianne as she meanders within aisles. Lips part, beneath an out of style and out of time moustache, as if the man meant to speak, though before any sound can break out, he’s stunted by the cut of foreign noise. The sound is a voice, shrill and feminine, quaking as though repulsed by something undeniably foul. “Holy shit, ew!” It’s something anyone could say, were they taken by a chaotic spirit, but this instance is accompanied by the clatter and clamor of other voices, what sounds to be a crowd. Exchanging a final glimpse of eye contact, Marianne and Hanneman both make for the door of the classroom, to see what was causing such a commotion. 

That either of them thought they could figure out the situation from spectation alone was a wild dream from conception. There is, indeed, a crowd. The fine details, details Marianne can’t reasonably pick up on through cursory stares, are as such; The congregation consists primarily of boys, a student from another class, Sylvain, is off to the side of the gathering, wearing an expression of disgust, shock, and even a splash of sorrow, the main conflict seems to be taking place before a restroom, and finally, though it’s the one thing Marianne takes note of at the time, Seteth, a member of Garreg Mach’s faculty, was in the middle of the pack, looking down and giving someone the business, his face reddening from what had to be anger. 

Hanneman, letting his tight-ass facade crumble a bit, turns his head towards Marianne, though keeps his eyes fixed upon the scene. “What do you suppose happened?” It’s phrased like a genuine question, though what the man really means is ‘what’s going on?’ He spent any and all of his social life with another teacher, Manuela, so he was rather weak for gossip. A bit ridiculous for his age. Marianne simply stares at the crowd, shaking her head in an effort to communicate just how clueless she was. “No… I have… I-I don’t know…” 

As much as she wished to be privy to what happened, Marianne never found it in herself to directly approach the crowd. Palpable tension, and school staff shooing away any nosy onlookers such as herself made it all too intimidating for the girl. As such, she received a LOT of secondhand information; Misinformation, to be more accurate. 

Marianne makes way for the front entrance of the school, keeping her head low, though ears high. “Sylvain was hitting on Flayn, and Miklan took the fall for it.” Flayn? Wasn’t she a few grades beneath them? “Miklan’s already a punk so he didn’t mind gettin’ in trouble for his little brother.” That didn’t sound right, it at least didn’t sound like Miklan. 

Marianne traipses through the front doors, scanning the parking lot and… not seeing her father yet. “Miklan started some shit with Mister Cichol in the bathroom.” Why would they fight in the restroom? Wait, the crowd was gathered in front of the girl’s room wasn’t it… “Oh, yeah, Miklan and Cichol throwin’ down in the chick’s room. ‘Kay jackass.” Marianne was almost getting frustrated with passersby, it seemed like no one knew what happened. 

With her head still low, Marianne listened to ambient conversation, waiting to hear her next snippet of gossip. “Yeah I don’t know what happened either…” … “...Tomorrow? Nah, I got work...” … “What? No, I don’t have your lighter. What, do you just have one lighter?” “█████!” Someone said a name, that name. Looking up, Marianne peers to see who was talking about her, only to hear “█████! Over here!” It’s behind her. Turning around, she sees the source. Her father’s face nestled within the confines of his deep blue, 86 wagoneer. Goddess was it ugly, but it was home. Seeing him smiling at her from across the parking spelled relief after another day of class, though she was a tad frustrated that her sleuthing had to be cut short.

___

“So, what happened?” Her father is in a state of slight intrigue, face painted with hardly raised brows and peeled eyelids. “I… I think there was a fight, I don’t know though. People kept mentioning Miklan, so I think he did something…” Flicking the blinker on, her old man keeps his gaze trained on the road, allowing his eyes to flicker with some semblance of memory. “Miklan, is that the same boy who--” “Yeah, he fought someone at lunch the other month... Another alpha…” That causes Marianne’s father to knit his brow, not in anger, but in concern, the obtuse angle of his expression speaking for itself. Marianne looks to him with that low face, reading his demeanor, before looking back out the passenger side window. 

A beat of silence passes, and the man speaks. “I don’t want you getting wrapped up in anything like that, █████.” Eyes remain fixed on Marianne, only flitting away to make sure their vehicle remained on the road. Without looking back, she nods. “I know Dad…” He hears her, yet feels as if there’s more to be said. Now returning his attention to the traffic before them, he goes on. “I just… You’ll tell me if any bullies give you a hard time, right?” Wearing a plaster smile, Marianne’s head skews back to spot her father. “I will Dad.” Her smile, as flat as it may be, gets one out of him. “Good deal.” He returns to piloting their car with his fullest attention. Though carved of plastic, the girl’s smile feels natural on her face, even beginning to fester into one more genuine, adopting the uglier traits of a real smile. The corners of her mouth stretch skin out, dimples crop up, and her eyes squint with the rise of her cheeks. The car slows at the crimson demands of a traffic light, and Marianne’s vacant stare travels. Trees were beginning to litter the sides of streets, which meant they were getting closer to the residential area of the city. She could see the place where she got her hair cut, the pharmacy no one’s ever been seen going into or out of, the suv stopped in front of them, the… the person looking back. The person staring back lived there, in the rear windows of cars, the reflective walls of restrooms, and sometimes even occupied aluminum spoons. Looking back was █████. Cyan locks let down past their shoulders, dark eyes sunken into pallid skin, and sprigs of hair threatening to sprout along their chin or even above their lip. When Marianne blinked, █████ blinked, staring back at her with an expression of remembrance. A plain, dour, remembrance. Marianne looked away, returning her gaze to the buildings they drove past. She was too careful as to look, but █████ was still there, in the windows they drove past. He was still smiling, but it was ugly no longer.

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be the one to write a/b/o in a not sucky ass way.


End file.
